Disclaimer: I don't own anything except the poor excuse for a plot. Yes, that is me fishing for compliments – reviews are always welcome ;-)

A/N: Well, I was aiming for another light-hearted chapter here, but Sirius plainly had other ideas, and then Remus gets in on the act too. . . thank God for Peter, that's all I can say, and how often do you hear that? Hopefully the next one will get back on track.

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Sirius took his time packing up after that class, trying to delay the inevitable questioning from the others. Everyone else in the class was gabbling happily about what had been a very enjoyable lesson. They gossiped about each other's Patronuses – about a third of the class had eventually produced a full one – and he heard Briony Westburrow bemoaning her squirrel.

"I mean, really, something as small as that, what good's it going to do me?" she asked as she walked past his desk. "Everyone else had big strong things. . . maybe I can change it?"

He didn't know if it was possible to change a Patronus once you had it. Would he want to anyway? After all, if Remus had never let him down, why would his Moony-Patronus? Same couldn't be said the other way round, of course; he had let Remus down badly on several occasions. Would Remus want to change Padfoot, if he could? And if Remus changed it, he couldn't keep Moony, that would just look odd. . . Bloody hell, he really hadn't thought his life could get more complicated.

The classroom was rapidly emptying, and James and Peter were watching him impatiently. Remus was standing to one side, determinedly not looking at anyone. Sirius didn't like to see that; it had been a long time since Remus had been so uncomfortable with them.

"Are we leaving some time today, Padfoot?" asked James.

"Lunch'll have started," added Peter.

"Coming," he muttered. He was ready anyway, just stalling; he fiddled with his bag for a couple of seconds more, then threw it over his shoulder with a sigh. They left the room in silence. Sirius didn't like that, either; he had had a lifetime's supply of it at his parents' house.

And the only thing he knew to do with silence was try to fill it, which was one of the reasons why he had always been in so much trouble at home.

"Hey, I was thinking. . . " he began, but didn't get any further before he was interrupted by groans from all three of his friends.

"Oh no!"

"That's never good."

He smiled to himself; he'd take all the insults in the world if it meant no more awkward silences. The fact that it made Remus laugh and stop looking so defensive was an added bonus.

"No, really, you'll like this one. . . "

"Padfoot, all of your thoughts end up landing us in detention."

"Yeah, I'd noticed that. . . very unfair, if you ask me. But this one's completely different. I was just thinking that this time next year, we'll all be qualified, respectable grown ups."

"You'll never be respectable," remarked James.

"That's just it, I don't want to be! So I was thinking, really, we need to put it off as long as possible, and I thought, you know, I'd really love to go travelling, there's loads of places I'd like to see. . . Why don't we all go? After graduation, take six months or so, and just go round the world. It'd be great!"

Silence of a different sort fell as everyone considered that.

"You know," said James thoughtfully, "That's actually not a bad idea. I mean, we're never going to get another chance to do it, are we? Once we're loaded down with jobs and bills and families and all that stuff."

"Be expensive, though," said Peter dolefully.

"Not as much as you'd think. If we stay in hostels, instead of booking into inns or hotels. Rent a cottage maybe, if we wanted to stay anywhere for longer than a couple of days. If we were careful about it, we could even stay in Muggle places; they'd work out pretty cheap."

"You've really given this some thought, haven't you?"

"A bit. I'm serious, you know, I think we'd have a great time. You up for it?"

Peter shrugged. "Yeah, if I can afford it."

"How 'bout you, Moony?"

"Can't," he replied shortly.

"Don't worry about the money, Moony," said Sirius. Remus had always been touchy about how poor he was. "I'll pay for you."

"Yeah, we can split it between us," added James, and Peter nodded eagerly despite his own misgivings. "It wouldn't be the same without you."

"It's not that."

"Oh, I get it," said James as they reached the Great Hall. "It's your furry little problem, isn't it? We could work around that. We'd just have to be careful about where we were at the time. There's bound to be out-of-the way places we could stay, remote cottages, that sort of thing, and you'd have all of us to keep an eye on you. . . "

"It's not that, either. I mean, that would be a problem, but. . . " he grimaced. They'd sat at one end of the already-crowded Gryffindor table but there were still plenty of people who could overhear. Not the best place for an in-depth discussion of this particular topic. Remus took a deep breath and continued, carefully. "You know the Ministry keeps a record of. . . of people with my condition?" That was news to Sirius and James, but Peter nodded. They looked at him in surprise.

"Came up in Care of Magical Creatures," he said apologetically.

"Right. Well. We're not allowed to just. . . leave the country whenever we feel like it. I have to. . . " he bit his lip and looked away. Sirius had never really given any thought to the consequences of Remus being a werewolf, not beyond the full moon itself. It seemed obvious, now, that there would be rules, and if he hadn't known Remus, it would have seemed only right. But seeing the distress it was causing his friend, he just felt angry that Ministry busybodies thought they had the right to dictate how Remus lived his life. As if the monthly transformations weren't punishment enough in their own right.

"I have to inform the Registry if I want to go abroad," he said, his voice so quiet they could barely hear it. "I have to give two months notice. I have to tell them exactly when and where I will be going and why, and when I'm due back. Then they have to inform the Ministry of the other country, and ask permission. Not everywhere will let us in. I have to report to an official of the foreign Ministry when I arrive and when I leave. When I was seven, my dad took us to France. A Ministry official followed us around the whole time, even when we were sat on the beach he was sat about ten yards away, watching me." Remus looked up; his eyes were flat and angry, and somehow Sirius knew there was worse yet to come.

"And the two countries have to agree that our Ministry won't be held responsible if anything happens while I'm there, and that if it does, I can be. . . dealt with. . . without the Ministry interfering."

"Dealt with?" repeated James, his voice horrified.

Remus shrugged, but wouldn't meet any of their eyes. Silence fell again and this time even Sirius could not think of anything to fill it with. They all focussed on their lunch. Sirius toyed with his sandwich, shredding the bread and picking at the filling.

"Don't s'pose you fancy a couple of weeks in Cornwall, instead?" said Peter. They all looked at him in astonishment and he went beet red. "Sorry. Stupid idea," he mumbled, looking back down at his plate.

"Did you have something specific in mind?" asked Remus, his voice strained. Sirius guessed it was due to the difficulty of finding something kind to say.

"Well, my Gran's got a cottage there, and she always leaves in the summer, says she can't stand the tourists. . . Muggles, you know. . . I thought maybe if we offered to look after the house. . . But anyway, it was a stupid idea. I just thought, you won't need to worry about all that. . . you know, stuff, if it was Cornwall. . ." he tailed off, redder than ever, and took a too-large gulp of his pumpkin juice, choking so hard that Sirius had to thump him.

"That's not actually that stupid," said James, sounding surprised. "We'd still be able to take a good month or so before starting work. . . Do you really think she'd let us use it?"

"Well, she hasn't met any of you," began Peter thoughtfully, and then looked surprised when they all burst out laughing. "What?"